Review of Asimov’s July/August 2017

A couple of interesting short stories in this issue. I like any stories that try to explore some of the weirdness in quantum mechanics, and “Other Worlds and This One” by Cadwell Turnbull looks at the many-worlds interpretation. Hugh Everett III, who developed the interpretation, plays a starring role in the story.

David Gerrold is, of course, a seasoned SF writer. His short story “The Patient Dragon” does not disappoint. (As with seemingly all the stories being published in this 40th anniversary year, a short aside allows the author chance to reminisce about the magazine. Gerrold’s contribution here is particularly touching.)

Recent tweets

RT @carlzimmer “Starting from random play, and given no domain knowledge except the game rules, AlphaZero achieved within 24 hours a superhuman level of play in the games of chess and shogi (Japanese chess)” arxiv.org/abs/1712.01815

RT @nature As debate rumbles on about how and how much poor statistics is to blame for poor reproducibility, Nature asked influential statisticians to recommend one change to improve science. The common theme? The problem is not our maths, but ourselves go.nature.com/2Ajn1pz